


teach a coward to love like a fool

by impetuousfool



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Fluff, M/M, canon typical loneliness, canon typical yearning, spoilers for ep 159
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-12
Updated: 2020-05-12
Packaged: 2021-03-02 18:27:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,343
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24131320
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/impetuousfool/pseuds/impetuousfool
Summary: jon & martin's first day at the safehouse together
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist
Comments: 29
Kudos: 203





	teach a coward to love like a fool

**Author's Note:**

> cw for a couple mentions of religion, allusions to asphyxiation, self-flagellation, and themes of isolation
> 
> thank you [nate](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pensivecowboyemoji/pseuds/pensivecowboyemoji) for beta-ing this!! he's a king, go check out his work.<33
> 
> loosely inspired by [this](https://nihhon.tumblr.com/post/616745546445733888/first-morning-together-in-the-safe-house-after) wonderful work of art, so go check out the rest of their work too!

they still stank of the ocean and the pitiful mist that sang the lamentations of the lost, but things were still and quiet. not the uncomfortable, suffocating silence of the lonely’s fog, just an easy tranquility settled between the inches of scarred hands, the delicate threads of understanding laced between two lost souls that’d found one another on the shores of an unforgiving beach and whispered _i’ve got you, don’t let go._

he could still taste the bile of loss, the guilt of failing yet another person he cared about. relief wasn’t something he trusted, but he took one look at the gentle face staring out at the fields outside the train’s window and realised he didn’t have time for mistrust. not again. mistrust had overstayed its welcome in his coward’s heart.

“martin,” he murmured, hoarse and tired, but oh so gentle. he said nothing, just angled his head towards him and blinked patiently. “are — are you alright?”

there was just quiet for a long time, moments passing without martin saying a word, the numb panic building up again. maybe he’d left some part of him in the lonely somehow and hadn’t saved him. had failed him. jon’s hand twitched forward to martin’s on the table, desperately checking he was there, that he wasn’t a ghoulish mimickary. 

jon watched as he looked down at their hands, where he’d cupped them so delicately. they were warm. they were… perfect, everything he’d thought about and squandered, just as welcoming as the man they belonged to. 

“i’m okay, jon. just tired,” he said, finally, and when his eyes met jon’s they were filled with such dutiful reverence. 

they stayed like that for hours, hands delicately brushing against one another with every slight movement, worshipper’s eyes meeting at intervals while they drifted to another world. martin drifted asleep, his thumb rested on jon’s palm, but he remained vigilant, scared he’d be gone when he woke up if he dared to close his eyes.

//

they didn’t unpack, both too exhausted to begin to think about it. martin sat gently curled beside him on the sofa, a warm, solid reminder that things were, for now, okay. he had to believe they would be, that for a moment they could exist outside the realms of eldritch horrors and ancient rituals, that the forsaken’s mists couldn’t touch them here if they clung to one another tight enough. 

the crackle of the fireplace reminded him too much of burning rage, of anger and the dreams he walked through where he watched as wax figures danced around their prey, carefully sculpting their fear until they were set alight in an unending chain of sacrifices to a messiah that never came. he gently shifted where he was against martin, instantly regretting it, missing the comforting presence beside him as he reached forwards to still the flickering lights in front of them, but martin moved with him.

this continued the rest of the day. jon moved to the kitchen to put together something for them to eat, and martin followed, a silent shadow, occasionally placing a hand against his arm, or a cheek on his shoulder, reaching out for an anchor to reality. jon reached back, touched his burnt palm to martin’s cheek and smiled. he cooked like that with the bits he could find in daisy’s cupboards, collecting the scraps and tying together something just for them. barely anything, but just enough, and martin took it gently from him with such a fragile smile that jon remembered how it felt to fall without space. 

jon had decided to trust this man who’d forgiven his misgivings and failures, who’d been wronged time and time again, yet still bore himself to jon with warm vulnerability. he’d put his heart in martin’s open palms and offered himself up when the idea of being loved, of being wholly known and seen, was the most terrifying thought of them all. in a world where gods feasted on their fear, where jon had faced them all, he found this terror like nothing else, so full of hope that no god could feed on it.

martin’s eyes began to drift closed on his shoulder as jon smoothed his fingers through salt-sea hair, the drain of the forsaken finally taking its toll, sapping his energy right out of his limbs. gently, jon urged him to stand, tenderly shepherding him towards the nearest of the two beds, a hand resting gently on his shoulder. martin collapsed into it and he covered him gently with cotton blankets, brushed a careful hand over his cheek once. and then he took a step back, placed himself on the chair beside the bed, sat vigilant beside martin’s resting place, a stoic guardian watching over him lest the lonely or some other _creature_ come back to take him. 

every shift of the house felt like the crushing walls of the coffin all over again, layers of suffocation of agony bearing down on his chest and filling his lungs with acrid dirt. fear surrounded him like an atmosphere of terror, colliding and spinning violently without the slightest care for what sort of debris it left behind, and jon couldn’t help but worry he’d put them all in the crossfire. how safe was a safehouse when there was a monstrous homing beacon inside it?

“jon.” he stopped and looked at the bed. martin’s eyes were open, a hand extended towards him, hovering in the space between them. “it’s alright, you know. you can join me.”

“a-are you sure? i can go upstairs—”

_“jon.”_

he stopped, then, and looked at him properly, the tiredness in his eyes, how bare and broken he looked. he was trying not to see, not to _know_ anything in case… _jonah_ could find them, but he didn’t need to. the raw nakedness with which martin looked at him, the quiet desperation to just have someone there after months of nothing. he nodded, quiet and uncertain, and martin’s hand curled back around him. somehow he looked small, far smaller than he was, and it hurt. 

he lay beside him and, rather suddenly, martin turned, his head resting on his shoulder, once again reaching for an anchor, and jon placed a hand on his shoulder, eyes open and watchful. 

“is that okay?” martin asked, voice small and uneasy, and a gentle tremor shivered through it. 

“yes. it’s okay, martin. i’m here.”

//

morning’s light burned, a mocking reminder that he’d failed his one duty: to stay awake, to protect the one person that remained and mattered. he flinched awake, martin’s solid weight now gone from where it was previously on his shoulder, a warm presence vanished in the night. he cursed himself for letting himself slip, for letting _him_ fade away, vanish into the forsaken once again. he’d failed him. _again._

he heard the fabric shift beside him, a small rustle, and he rolled so quickly his vision blurred, but he saw him there, shy and uncertain, lips parted, hands clasped together on his chest. _martin._ jon reached out like he was a ghost, hand landing so tentatively on his shoulder, and he felt relief wash through him. they were _safe,_ maybe for the first time in years. no lonely, no jonah. just them.

they watched one another, as if waiting for the illusion to pass, checking for some sort of tell, or a reason to not believe that this was real, but it was, and jon so badly wanted it to be. he reached for martin’s arm, his warm, perfect arm, and held it close, intertwining their fingers together with the intention of never letting go. 

“morning,” he said, resting his head on martin’s shoulder, their eyes watching one another with a warmth jon had missed for so long, awkward glances exchanged over tea, sorry looks over a goodbye. there was always something hanging over them, always the next goodbye, the next monster, but now he didn’t know. he didn’t like not knowing. but he was willing to give it a chance, if he wasn’t alone.

“morning, jon.”


End file.
